


I Worry About Nothing

by SpaceCommunist



Category: Marble Hornets
Genre: F/M, Post-Finale
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2015-05-13
Updated: 2015-12-06
Packaged: 2018-03-30 09:16:48
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence, Major Character Death
Chapters: 8
Words: 15,940
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/3931387
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/SpaceCommunist/pseuds/SpaceCommunist
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Jay has apparently come back from the dead, without a trace of bullet scarring. After seeing the final entries posted by Tim, he has decided to find some answers as to where Tim went, what happened to Jessica, how he's alive in the first place, and how to defeat the Operator once and for all.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Revival

**Author's Note:**

> This is a work in progress. I'll try to update this whenever I can, though I won't make any promises. ;)

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Jay's awakens beneath Benedict Hall.

_There was something...something amongst the trees...was it...? Then a hand...a bottle of pills...a gun...._

Jay, lying on his back against a wall, awoke with a start. The first thing that came to his mind was that he was still in the dimly-lit, dusty room beneath the broken corridors of Benedict Hall. The second thing that came to mind was that this was the room where he had been dying, before it came and took him away to....

...wait a second. Was he dead?

He took a second to feel around his belly. Looking down, he noticed that indeed, his clothes were bloody and a small hole was visible in his shirt; the skin beneath, however, was intact and unharmed.

But he had been dead, he knew it! Alex had shot him, he'd stumbled into this little room, and began to bleed out, when that thing came and took him to...he couldn't remember. He took a second to concentrate, but found that he had absolutely no memory of arriving anywhere. For all he knew, he hadn't even gone anywhere; he might as well as just blacked out in this little room.

Still, the fact that he had died was known to him, somehow. Was _it_ being around when he died the reason he could remember? Jay had no way of knowing, but it was the best guess he could make. In any case, it mattered less than the fact that he was apparently back from the dead. How had it happened? Was he really alive, or did he end up in hell like his grandmother always said he would?

Jay began to feel around him, just to get a sense that he was still in reality. The ground, unsurprisingly, felt as cracked and damp as an abandoned basement should. At the very least, it felt real....

To his surprise, Jay felt himself touch something metal by his side. He looked down and saw his camera at his side, like a loyal pet. Almost immediately, he felt a wave of relief wash over him. He picked it up and looked at the screen; as it would seem, the camera was already on, only recently having started recording. From what he could tell, there didn't seem to be any sort of damage to it, physically and digitally.

With a new sense of resolve, Jay stood up and held his camera ahead of himself, as he had done so many times in the past five years. Considering this fact, a new question popped up in his mind: how long had it been since he had died? Days? Weeks? Months? Years? The decrepit walls around him were no good indicator, as they were already well-aged. Or had no time passed at all? Was Alex still out in the hallway, waiting for him?

At this thought, Jay felt a pain in his gut (and hoped that this wasn't the bullet still inside him). Alex had shot him...Alex had killed him. He began to grow angry, knowing what Alex had done to him, not to mention everyone else involved with the shooting of _Marble Hornets_.

He turned to the door—surprisingly, it was open; he could have sworn he closed it when he stumbled in here in the first place—and slowly, with a heart full of fear, peeked out. There was no sign of Alex, nor his faceless companion. Relieved, but still aware of the possibility of danger, Jay crept out, looking back and forth across the underground hallway. Then, as soon as he was sure that he was alone, he booked it outta there as fast as he could.

—————————————

It didn't take him long to reach his car. As soon as he did, he jumped in, started the engine, and pulled away; he wasn't gonna take any more risks of being ambushed at Benedict Hall any time soon.

It wasn't until he was a few miles away that he gave a sigh of relief. The road was one of the few places that Jay ever felt safe; still, it always carried that connotation of constantly having to run away, to flee from an ever-persistent danger that would never, ever stop chasing him...but regardless, it was a temporary safe haven time and time again, as it was now.

So he had solved the problem of finding safety, if only for now. Beyond that, he still had all these questions. How was he alive? How long had it been since he died? Where was Alex? Where was Tim, for that matter?

It dawned upon Jay that he could answer at least two of those questions pretty easily. He took his phone out of his pocket and tried to turn it on—but, unfortunately, the battery was dead. Apparently, he'd been dead long enough for his phone to have died, though that answered as much about the time he'd spent beneath Benedict Hall as the rotting wall had. But it was nothing; Jay simply attached a car charger to it and waited until a dim glow came on the screen. Picking it back up, he turned it on, and saw the date from his calendar app:

_June 21st, 2014_

But that...that was 5 months to the day he'd gone beneath Benedict Hall! Where had he been all that time—and, more importantly, why hadn't he decomposed by now? And of course, what had happened to Tim and Alex?

Regardless, he still had a means of answering another question easily. He would go to Tim's house, see if he was there, wondering where Jay had gone off to. How was Jay going to explain what had happened to him? Would Tim even be willing to talk to Jay after how he'd tied him up?

In the meantime, Jay decided to save some battery power on the camera. Plugging it to a car charger as well, he moved it from his dashboard to the passenger seat. Pulling on to the route towards Tim's house, he turned the camera off.


	2. Everything is Fine

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Jay discovers the final entries.

Not an hour passed before Jay began pulling onto Tim's street. Once he'd passed the street sign, he turned the camera back on. Even before he was at the house, he knew that  _it_ liked to stay in areas where victims came by, and that often extended beyond just one building. Thus, he'd rather have the camera on right then, even though he was several turns away from the house.

Jay frowned at his own thoughts. At the very least, it  _seemed_ like the monster enjoyed those kinda of places. Nothing was ever certain about that thing; its motives, its limitations, its habitat, its origins, all of them were mysteries....

He held his breath. He was coming closer to the house now, and with it, Tim. Jay had no idea what kind of reaction his sideburn-adorned friend would have. Perhaps he'd come beneath Benedict Hall and seen Jay's lifeless body? But he couldn't have; Jay had been taken...somewhere. That much he was certain of. But either way, Tim would've known that he had escaped from the house thanks to the aid of the hooded man—"Hoody", the replies to Jay's twitter called him or her. Jay had uploaded the video to the youtube page, so Tim was bound to know about the escape to Benedict Hall. But surely, then, the trail would've gone cold after that. So ultimately, Jay really had no idea what to expect. At the very least, he knew that his reception would not be a warm one.

It was then that Jay rounded a corner and reached the charred remains of Tim's house.

At first, Jay was frozen solid by shock. Then, almost a full minute of stillness and silence, he snatched the camera from the passenger seat and got out of the car, running towards the ash and rubble that was once a building.

"Tim!  _Tim!_ " he screamed, though of course no one was there to answer. A line of yellow cautionary tape ran around the ruins, but it didn't stop Jay. He ducked under it and began frantically kicking and shuffling the charred remnants of Tim's house in the hopes of finding a body, or a sign, or just  _something_. But to no avail; he soon came to a stop, with nothing to look at but blackened ruination.

But now seemed not to be the time for questions. As it happened, a slight whirring noise came from Jay's camera. He looked at it, then the spot it was pointing towards.

 _It_ was about ten yards away, staring at him.

Jay stumbled backwards, falling as he did so. He dropped the camera for a brief moment, then picked it back up as he got back on his feet. He took a quick glance back;  _it_ was closer, about five yards now. That was all he needed to motivate him to run as fast as he could to his car. Just like at Benedict Hall, he pulled away from there and didn't look back.

An hour ago, Jay thought he'd be able to find answers. But by going back to Tim's house—or, at least, what remained of it—he'd only found more questions. What had happened to the house? Was Alex responsible? Or did "Hoody" have something to do with it? Where was Tim? Was he alright?

All of the questions, the confusion, hell, the fact that he was apparently  _back from the dead_ —all of this was too much for him. At the very least, he could upload what his camera had captured; as always, the viewers, the ones who'd stuck with him the whole way through, deserved to know what had happened since he'd gone to Benedict Hall.

As soon as he left the neighbourhood, he knew where to go. There was a church not too far from there, where he could park, get out, and upload his entry via the church's wifi. By now, he was on Entry #80; how many more entries he would upload before this whole mess was over, he didn't know.

Eventually, he came to a stop at the church's parking lot. Fortunately, the Sunday service was tomorrow, not today, so he was isolated enough to make the upload without being watched. He grabbed the camera, stepped outside, and walked to the back of his car. When he opened the trunk, however, he was met by a surprise: his laptop was missing.

Jay searched all around the trunk, and then the rest of the car for his PC. But it was all for naught; it was gone, and with it the window to the viewers. Had it been stolen? More than likely, yes. Once again, he had thought he had some control of the situation, only for him to lose grasp of it even further.

Jay just stood there. Now what was he supposed to do? He had no means of finding Tim, "Hoody", Alex, or any answers to the questions that burned within him. Surely there was *something* he could do....

He began to lean against his car and think. It took him a while, but he managed to think of something: there was a public library in town, where he could use one of the computers in there to upload the entry. With that in mind, he hopped back into the car and drove towards the center of the town. Maybe there, for once, he could regain _some_ measure of control over the situation.

———————————————

As it happened, he didn't come across any burnt buildings, manipulated gunmen, masked attackers, or faceless monsters when he stepped inside the library. In fact, he found no trouble at all. Finding a computer and plugging his camera into it was a synch. Now, all he had to do was pull up a basic movie-making program and upload the result to youtube. Fortunately, the computer had Windows Movie Maker—not a particularly good option, but he didn't have much choice. As the contents of his camera were being transferred into the computer, he went ahead and logged into the MarbleHornets channel so he could get ready to upload the entry.

It was at that moment that Jay had a thought: Tim had a chest cam the day that he went to Benedict Hall. Surely, by now, he must have uploaded his findings. With this in mind, Jay went over to the list of videos uploaded onto the channel; to his surprise, there was not one, but _eight_ videos uploaded. He definitely had time to watch them, so he took out some headphones, plugged them in, and began to do just that.

Suffice to say, he wasn't prepared for what he saw.

Entry #80'a footage was still on his camera, but somehow Tim had come across the camera and taken it to upload it...? How was that even possible, he had his camera with him right now! Not to mention, it was pretty confirmed that that monster had taken him...somewhere. Where, then, had he gone to?

Entry #81 was what Jay had expected Entry #80 to have been. Nothing out of the ordinary, at least for the stuff he had to deal with.

Entry #82 was even weirder than Entry #80. Jay had no memory of going anywhere near Rosswood Park that day, and yet apparently he had. No wonder he'd gotten so easily mad at Tim—an anger he deeply regretted by now, as it had driven away Jay's only ally by that point, and ultimately lead to his death. On a sidenote, he discovered that it had been Tim who had stolen his laptop. That was at least better than Alex or "Hoody" taking it.

Entry #83...was a doozy. So Tim killed the hooded man, huh? But there was still no clue as to who the man was. Plus, Jay saw his own lifeless body...that definitely left chills. But then, why did Jay get sent to Tim's house? And where did all the papers beneath him come from? Was that actually Tim's house...or something else?

Entry #84 managed to answer one question. Apparently, the hooded man had been Brian all along...but that didn't add up with what Entry #51 showed. How could Brian have been the hooded man if he was killed so long ago? Then again, Jay had been killed twice by now—in Entry #71, and his most recent encounter with Alex—so it was not beyond the realm of possibility for Brian to have come back.

Entry #85 revealed what happened to Tim's house. Thank god he'd managed to survive that fire, though Jay had no idea where Tim would go after that....

Entry #86...was another doozy. Alex was gone, and with him went the monster. But that was impossible; Jay had just seen it an hour ago, back by the ruins of Tim's house! Something was amiss, a something that only the last entry could answer.

Entry #87...was too much. Jay merely say in complete silence at what he'd just seen. Dozens of emotions ran through his mind at once; joy, despair, tension, relief...Jessica was alive, but Tim had...oh, god...anger and rage...and then Tim driving away from the sound of sirens to...oh, who even knew where?...and the closing line: "Everything is fine."

Well, everything sure as hell was _not_ fine.

Jay was just absolutely at a loss for words. Alex was dead, Brian was dead, Jessica had been attacked, and Tim was just...gone. And he had lied; he had  _lied_ the whole damn time about Jessica, and never said a thing otherwise! The anger he'd felt when he last saw Tim came bubbling back up, and he really had to fight to suppress the urge to yell.

But now, he knew exactly what he needed to do.

Jay checked the camera; it had long since finished transferring its contents to the computer. He then went to edit the video. It wasn't much more than cutting some unnecessary stuff and adding text, of course, but his message after the video was very clear:

_I managed to get to find a computer at the library and upload this entry after what happened at the ruins of Tim's house. Suffice to say that I don't plan on going back there any time soon. But that's not important to me—not anymore. I've just seen the entries Tim uploaded after I, um, died—which, for the record, I still don't know how to explain. In any case, I've seen them. I never knew that Jessica was alive, let alone being hidden by Tim. But I do know this: I'm going to find them. And I'm going to find some answers._


	3. The Hospital

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Jay visits the clinic to find any trace of Jessica.

It didn't take Jay long to gather up his belongings and leave the library. He'd seen and heard enough from the last entries to make his decision: he was going to find Jessica and Tim, and there wasn't a damned thing out there that could convince him to do otherwise.

As he stepped outside with his camera, Jay began to think: who should he search for first? He had next to no leads on where each other might be. Tim had driven off on the interstate highway to a fork in the road; if he didn't take the turn towards Rosswood Park, then there was no way Jay could know where he had gone. Even if he did, in fact, go into Rosswood Park, Jay did  _not_  want to wander into that forest any time soon. Still, Tim only had one pill bottle left; surely he couldn't have intended to try and overdose, after doing the same in Entry #65 with no lethal results. Considering that Tim was out of a job and only just had the pills left, that meant he could run out of them very quickly, and be left lost, confused, and relapsing in the forested lair of an eldritch monster. Of course, Jay had no idea if all of this could even be the case; he simply had no clue.

Jessica's fate, however, was just as lacking in clues. The last shot implied that Tim had indeed attacked her; she could very well be dead. Assuming that he  _did_ attack her, then that left both the possibility of death--Jay's gut turned over at the very thought of that--or she survived, and was taken to safety somehow. Perhaps she had called an ambulance and had headed off for the hospital? It was a stretch, but it was all Jay could assume.

And so, at this point, it was either go looking for Jessica in the hospital, or go into Rosswood Park looking for Tim. The hospital, to him, at least seemed like a  _safer_ assumption. Plus, Jay still felt a twinge of guilt for bringing Jessica into this whole mess. So with that thought, it was settled: Jay would go to the hospital to find Jessica.

As he turned on the car and began to pull away from the library parking lot, Jay spotted a figure standing behind one of the library windows from the corner of his eye. It certainly wasn't that  _thing_ ; it seemed much shorter, and Jay had never seen it in such a well-populated area before. Still, something in his gut told him that there wasn't something right about the figure, yet he couldn't understand  _why_. The sun hit the window in such a way that Jay couldn't make out the figure's face, or even it's complete outline, meaning a further glance at it was relatively pointless. But one thing that sent chills down Jay's spine was clearly noticable: the figure was staring right at him. But regardless, by the time Jay had noticed this, he was already on the road and on his way to the hospital.

It took him about fifteen minutes to get there; after all, the hospital was on the opposite side of town from the library. Nevertheless, he had made it there safe and sound. Jay parked in one of the empty spaces and hopped out, taking a moment to gaze at the building before him. The hospital was an "L"-shaped building, with the inward angle facing him. It stood about five stories high, all of it covered in a pale white paint. Jessica had to be somewhere inside of that building, and Jay knew it. with that in mind, he set off for the entrance.

Once he got inside, Jay looked over and spotted a receptionist sitting at a desk, typing up something on the computer in front of her. He looked around the room a bit, and then headed over to the desk. As he approached, the receptionist looked up and said, "Hello, young man. Can I help you?"

"Uh, yeah, I'm looking for someone who's been, uh, hospitalized in the last few days. Is there a patient here named Jessica Locke?" he asked.

"Oh, you mean that poor girl who came here in an ambulance last night? Yes sir, we certainly do," replied the receptionist.

The slightest of gasps escaped Jay's breath. She was here after all! It had been practically years since he'd last seen her, and he'd finally been able to find her!

"Ah, okay, well, uh, I'm here to visit her, and see if she's, uh, alright," he stuttered.

"Very well, sir," said the receptionist. "Can I have your name?"

Jay paused. He wasn't sure if he should be giving around his name; it had been nearly a year since he'd been last seen, after all.

"Um, okay, it's, uh, Craig. Craig Digsby."

The receptionist glanced up and gave him a look, but then went back to typing. "Okay then, we'll be sure to let her know you're coming. She's in room 327."

"Thanks," said Jay, who then promptly turned around and headed for the nearest elevator.

As the elevator lifted him up to the third floor, Jay began to wonder how Jessica might react to him reappearing after not seeing her for so long. Did she even remember him? Did she still have all the nightmares about her being a kid, with  _it_ following her around? Or had the amnesia really settled in, just as Entry #87 implied? Deep down, he hoped that she remembered  _something_ about him. She seemed to have known his name, after all, and wanted to meet him. That was about the only consolation he would get, it seemed, until he stepped into her room and spoke with her. Perhaps then, things would be a bit less convoluted. Once the elevator reached the floor and Jay approached door #327, there was only one way to find out.

He gave a knock. "Come in," said a familiar voice on the other side.

His heart thumping against the inside of his chest, Jay turned the knob and opened the door, taking a step inside.

Before him was Jessica, sitting in a bed next to a desk with pills on it. There were bruise marks here and there on her, but quite a few around her neck. Jay felt his stomach drop at the sight of her, battered and beaten on a hospital bed. This was, ultimately, his fault, and he could only feel regret and shame for it.

As he stepped in, Jessica looked up at him. "Hello...?" she said, seemingly confused at who stood before her.

Jay didn't know what to think. Didn't she recognize him? "Hey, Jessica...it's me, Jay. Jay Merrick," he said.

"Oh, you're Jay!" she said, with a look that signaled her understanding. "You must be that guy that Tim mentions now and then."

Jay's heart sank. So she didn't quite remember him, after all...the only thing she seemed to remember at this point was that Tim talked about Jay, all while hiding the truth from her...and from Jay, too.

"...yeah, that's me," he replied. "Listen, are you alright? I saw--I mean, I heard that you got assaulted by somebody, and I came to see if you were alright." _  
_

"I mean, I've been better...." she said, pointing at some of her bruises. "But yeah, it was your buddy, Tim."

"Tim?" said Jay, in fake surprise. "But he'd never do anything like that--"

"But he  _did_ , though," said Jessica. "One moment he's coughing on the ground, and the next moment he tries to strangle me and takes my pills. Someone must've called the police, because the next thing I know, I'm in a hospital."

"That sounds awful, I'm so sorry he did that to you," Jay said. Yeah, sorry for the strangling, and just about everything else....

"So why did you come here? I thought he said you moved away," Jessica asked, sitting up now. She glanced at his camera. "And why are you pointing that thing at me?"

Jay wasn't completely sure if he should tell Jessica the truth or not. She at least deserved to know what was going on, but at the same time, that could endanger her even further by exposing her completely to that  _thing_.

"Yeah, well, I'm just visiting town for the moment to, uh, buy a Christmas tree for my mom. Can't find any out where I live now--it's an urban area, so I'm not close to any actual forests or large plants...so yeah, I'm in town for a bit. Thought I'd drop by," he lied.

"Ah, okay," said Jessica.

"Yeah. And the camera is...well, it's just a personal thing I carry around," he continued.

"Uh-huh, just like the last time I saw you," said Jessica, with a deadpan expression.

Jay froze. The last time they'd met?

"Uh...Jessica? I don't think we met before today--" he lied again.

"Really? So you never saw me at a motel?" said Jessica, still expressionless.

"Um, I mean, you might have seen somebody  _like_ me in a motel one time..." he began to stutter.

"Okay, so there's _two_ Jay Merricks out there who carry cameras and are very bad at lying," Jessica interrupted.

"Bad at lying? I'm not a bad liar!" Jay said defensively.

"Oh really? You came to get a Christmas tree in June?"

Jay didn't know how to respond. Seems he was, after all, a pretty bad liar.

"I thought so," said Jessica, now with an irritated look on her face. "Look, all I know is that I woke up in a hotel and you were the only one there with me. Then some wearing a hoodie takes me out to the woods, my roommate's boyfriend tries to shoot me, and...and some  _thing_  follows me out there. Then I wake up on a road, and Tim starts helping me get medicine, and then  _he_ attacks me, and now  _you_ are back here again. I don't know how any of this started, but it seems to me that you were the first person I saw when this mess began. You  _know_ something, and I want to know what that something is! So either tell me, or get away from me before you bring me into a new mess altogether!"

Jay hadn't thought that his heart could sink any lower, but to his surprise it could. "Look, Jessica--"

"Give. Me. The TRUTH!" she yelled, now furious with him.

At this point, he wasn't completely sure what he should do. He wanted to tell her everything, tell her about the tapes, and the disappearances, and the masked men, and Alex's madness, and totheark, and Tim's lies, and Brian's manipulation, and that goddamn  _monster_ , but he wasn't sure if he could bring himself to do so. _  
_

"Jessica...I used to be a part of a student film project called _Marble Hornets_...." he began.

There was a pause, and then Jessica spoke. "And? Is that all you're gonna tell me?"

Jay bit his lip. "I...Jessica, I just can't tell you--"

"Then get the  _hell_ out of my room!" she thundered. _  
_

Jay stood helplessly in front of her, her livid expression locking onto his hurt one. A moment passed, and then Jay slowly turned and walked out of the room.

All the way back to his car, Jay felt absolutely terrible. Not only had he dragged her into this mess, but now she apparently hated him. One of the biggest reasons he had even continued to investigate the paranormal stuff surrounding Alex Kralie and the  _Marble Hornets_ crew's disappearances was simply to try and find Jessica. Now that he had found her, however, he couldn't help but feel worthless. All that effort, all that time spent searching for her, all the deaths surrounding him--and ultimately, he had just been shouted at. And now what? All he could do was look for Tim, but that would be just as fruitless, wouldn't it? He had already tied Jay up and lied to him for months on end about Jessica; why on Earth would Tim be glad to see Jay again? Especially considering that he might very well be wandering around after a major relapse....

Jay's train of thought was interrupted, however, by a little dinging noise from his cell phone. He checked it and saw that he had just missed a phone call and a voicemail from an unfamiliar number. He put the phone on speaker mode and listened to the voicemail:

_"Hey Jay, it's me, Alex. Listen, uh, I'm in Rosswood, that town about 90 miles away. I just tried calling Amy and Brian, but they're not answering their phones, and I need to have a ride back home so I can finish filming Marble Hornets this week. In the meantime I'm staying at the local motel, in room 253, so just call me back and let me know if you could pick me up. Thanks."_


	4. ######

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> ⓍⓍⓍⓍⓍⓍⓍⓍⓍⓍⓍⓍⓍⓍⓍⓍⓍⓍⓍⓍⓍⓍⓍⓍ
> 
> 49 20 41 4D 20 53 54 49 4C 4C 20 48 45 52 45
> 
> ⓍⓍⓍⓍⓍⓍⓍⓍⓍⓍⓍⓍⓍⓍⓍⓍⓍⓍⓍⓍⓍⓍⓍⓍ

death smiles at us

again and again


	5. Kralie

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Jay has a run-in with an "old friend". Actually, scratch that, they weren't even friends for that long, let alone good friends. More or less just acquaintances when it came to filmmaking...ah, who the hell cares anyways.

Alex.

Alex just called.

Alex Kralie had just called him, the  _same_ Alex Kralie that had been driven to madness and started killing everyone who had been associated with the production of  _Marble Hornets_.

Jay had already gone through an emotional rollercoaster when seeing Jessica, and he sure as hell didn't feel like going on another one. That, of course, didn't stop him from getting pissed as all hell. This was the man who had gone and killed everyone in  _Marble Hornets_ \--the same man who had killed Jay,  _twice_. The same man that Tim had stabbed in the neck and  _killed_. How had Alex even come back from the dead, much less end up in a hotel with an apparently new cell phone?

Jay stood and thought about the situation for a moment. He himself had managed to come back from the dead, somehow; but even Jay didn't know how that was possible, let alone how it had happened. And to make matters more confusing, Jay seemed to remember everything up until he had been killed in Entry #80. Alex, however, was talking about the original  _Marble Hornets_ production like it was still going on; did his return give him some kind of amnesia? Jay had a similar case when he had apparently returned after Entry #71, in that he didn't remember being strangled to death. But to lose years upon years of time...that just seemed so odd and out-of-place. Then again, this was all a matter of coming back from the dead; who the hell was Jay to say that amnesia wouldn't be an issue?

In any case, Jay was once again presented with two options: go find a crazed and relapsing medical patient in a haunted forest, or go meet a crazed murderer with amnesia. Once again, Jay chose the less dangerous option--albeit finding Alex wasn't much less dangerous than finding Tim. Nevertheless, he had made his choice, and he knew that he needed to follow through with it.

Once he was in his car, driving towards the motel, he tried to get his mind away from everything that had happened at the hospital. It hadn't even been bittersweet, in the end...yes, he had found her, but she just about seemed to  _hate_ him. She felt it was all his fault...and the worst thing was, she was right. He had called her about Amy; he had taken her along into Rosswood Park; he had fled to the motel with her; and it had all gone downhill from there.

 _'No,'_ thought Jay. _'I need to stop thinking about that. It'll just wear me down and distract me from what I should be focusing on: finding Alex.'_

And so that's just what he did. He put aside every thought of the day's events thus far, no matter how annoyingly they tugged at the back of his mind. All he need worry about was finding Alex.  _'_ _Finding Alex...finding Alex....'_

But something else managed to pop into his head. Was it possible that Alex was lying?...No, Jay just didn't seem to believe it. Alex sounded too much like his cheery self from five years ago. Back when Jay and Alex were in touch after Entry #36, Alex's calls were always short, frustrated, and to-the-point. This just wasn't one of those calls. Still, if Alex was lying, Jay had no means of defending himself....

No. He wasn't gonna let that stop him. He wasn't going to be scared away from Alex anymore. He had come back from the dead twice now; he could do it again.

Jay reached the motel, and with it, the point of no return. Inside lurked Alex, and with him, maybe some answers. He got out of his car and walked right into the side entrance, not even bothering to talk to the receptionist in the lobby. This was business that needed to be settled  _now._

As he marched inside and up the stairs, Jay couldn't help but feel an overwhelming feeling of rage. Alex was here, the same one who had shot him. He could make him pay; he could make him pay for  _everything_ he had done over the past five years. All it would take is a little struggle, and it would be done.

He walked up to room 253 and knocked, thoughts of anger and revenge filling his head. The door opened.

Alex looked at Jay behind his small, rectangular glasses. "Oh, hey Jay! I didn't know you'd be coming so quickly. You already in town for something?" he said, a smile beaming across his face.

Jay caught his breath. This really wasn't the same Alex he'd known for the past five years, after all; this was Alex from back in college, that same kind and shy nerd he'd known only through their film works. But at the same time, he looked different; this Alex had the same grizzly facial hair, the same cap, the same...well,  _everything_ as the Alex from Entry #86. Yet his stance, his appearance, his goddamn  _smile_ all said otherwise. That, and the fact that Jay wasn't facing the bad end of a handgun right about now, all screamed that this wasn't a trap of some kind.

All his thoughts of revenge came back to his mind in an instant, but Jay did not react. Instead, he simply stood there, frozen by just the impossibility of Alex standing in front of him.

"Um...Jay? Is everything alright?" asked Alex, his eyebrows furrowed in confusion.

"Let me in," Jay finally said, after what seemed to be hours. It was abrupt and full of all the hate and pain he'd felt for the past five years...frankly, if he'd said that to anyone else, they'd probably slam the door in his face.

"Uh, sure, come on in," said Alex, evidently taken aback at how harsh Jay's words were. He held the door open a few feet more, and Jay marched inside.

The room looked exactly like all the others in the motel. It had the same pair of beds, the same desk, hell, it even had that same small safe beside the bed closest to the door. But it certainly wasn't the same situation; instead of hiding from Alex, here he was standing with the very same man.

It occurred to Jay that he was starting to get a headache. Whether or not this was from what had happened earlier at the library and the hospital or if it was from Alex Kralie standing in front of him, he wasn't sure. But at this point, he could care less about headaches.

"So Jay, uh, how's everything been going?" asked Alex, standing at the entry hall to the door. He looked over at Jay's camera. "What's with the camera?"

Jay wanted to jump at him, to smash his head against a wall, to do  _something_ as payback for all the pain and misery from the past few years. But somehow, he couldn't bring himself to do that. All he could do was speak.

"Alex...do you have  _any_  idea why you're in Rosswood right now?" Jay asked, locking eyes with Alex.

"In Rosswood?" repeated Alex. "Uh...well, actually, I was hoping you or someone else might be able to tell me that."

Jay wanted to be incredulous, but he already knew the answer. Seems the amnesia had settled in after all. But just how bad was it?

"Do you know what day it is?" he asked.

"I think it's, uh, Tuesday. Why?" replied Alex.

"Alright, now tell me what month it is," Jay continued.

"April," Alex said. His face was know riddled with an expression of confusion. Oh, but he would understand soon enough.

"And what year is it?" _  
_

"Year? Jay, look, where are you going with this--" began Alex.

"Tell me what year you think this is!" demanded Jay. The anger welling up inside of him was starting to leak.

"Fine, fine! It's 2006!  _Christ_ , Jay!" Alex answered, throwing his hands up as if to calm Jay down.

 _'So the amnesia really_ is  _this bad....'_ thought Jay.  _'He really wasn't kidding when he mentioned finishing the filming of_ Marble Hornets _....'_

A brief moment of silence passed, and then Jay spoke again.

"Alex...it's 2014. You cancelled  _Marble Hornets_ and moved here with Amy."

"...okay, Jay, if you're trying to prank me or something--" Alex started.

"No, Alex,  _listen to me!_ It isn't 2006 anymore, and a hell of a lot of stuff has happened since then!" Jay snapped.

"Jay, stop it! You're not being funny, y'know!" Alex said back, a bit of anger rising in his voice.

"Oh really? Check the date on your phone!" Jay said, pointing to the square bulge in Alex's right pocket.

"Okay, sure, let's settle it...." Alex replied, taking out his phone. He clicked the little button on the top and swiped it aside, clearly searching for the calender app. After a while, his thumb stopped moving, and his expression turned blank.

"Tell me what day it says," Jay demanded.

He expected Alex to be reluctant, but to his surprise Alex answered. "June 21st...2014," he said, a note of uncertainty in his voice.

Alex looked back up at Jay, now looking worried. "Jay," he asked, "what's going on?"

He didn't hesitate to tell Alex the truth. Unlike Jessica, that  _monster_ had been follo wing Alex for years upon years; telling him no w  wasn't going to change anything, or at least that's  what he suspected. And so he told Alex all he could; how he got angry during filming, how  _it_ began to stalk him, how he started going nuts and killing everybody, then ran away and lived with Amy for a while. He told him about how Jay got involved, how he found Alex--or, rather, vice-versa--how the monster started following them again, how Alex went crazy again, how Jessica got involved, how the hooded and masked guys saved them, how the amnesia settled in, how Jay allied himself with Tim, how they began searching for Jessica and for answers, how Jay eventually started losing it, how Alex killed Jay  _again_ , and how Tim killed Alex.

Once it was over, Alex didn't respond. Jay got the feeling that he wanted to deny it, but the fact that Jay was right about it being 2014 seemed to be enough to give him doubt.  


"Jay..." Alex said, after sitting silently for quite a while, "if you're trying to mess with me...."

"No, don't even start with that!" Jay interrupted. "You want proof? I've got  _loads_ of proof. I know you've got a laptop somewhere, let me see it!"

Alex raised an eyebrow, but didn't say anything. Instead, he got up and went over to the nearby closet, rummaged through it, and took out a case. Sitting back down on the bed, he took out a silver laptop and a charging cable, then hooked them up to a nearby power outlet. After turning on the laptop, he gave a quick glance back at Jay.  


"How did you know I had a laptop with me?" he asked.

"You were bound to have had one over the years if you wanted to keep up with Tim and I," said Jay. It seemed that their guess that Alex had been watching the channel to see where the two usually hid was valid after all.

Alex signed in, and then handed the laptop to Jay. Jay sat down next to Alex and then opened a web browser. He wasted no time going to YouTube and pulling up the MarbleHornets channel, going straight to the "Introduction" video.

"Okay Alex, here's all the proof you need. I started this channel back in 2009 when I found some of the old tapes you gave me. I used this to record everything that happened from 2009 to this very day. There's also another channel called 'totheark'; you'll learn more about it soon enough. You might want to get comfortable, because this is going to take a while," he explained, handing the laptop back to Alex.

Alex gave him an inquisitive look, but then turned his gaze back to the screen, watching the rest of "Introduction".

And so the two sat and watched video after video, entry after entry, totheark reply after totheark reply. Initially, Alex was very vocal; twice during Entry #1, he mentioned how he had no memory of "that guy in the suit"; but as the entries went on, he became more and more silent. Occasionally, his eyes would grow wide; Jay suspected he must have some memories of those moments. But as the day went on and the entries progressed, Alex became more and more horrified. Eventually, at the end of Entry #52, he asked Jay to stop.

"Please...I don't want to see any more of this, Jay," he pleaded.

Naturally, however, Jay refused, and pressed on to Entry #53. Alex fell silent once more, and watched the rest of the entries without speaking. He gave an incredulous glance at Jay at the end of Entry #80, but Jay's own expression did not change. At the end of Entry #86, he put a hand to the side of his neck, rubbing it as if to find some trace of the stab wound left by Tim. At that point, he and Jay watched through Entry #87. Both recoiled at the sight of Jessica; even Jay, who had seen her only moments before, could still hardly believe that she was alive. Then the newly-uploaded Entry #88 passed by, showing Jay awake in the bottom of Benedict Hall where Alex had shot and killed him. Once it was all over, Alex sat there with a look of absolute shock.

"There. Do you believe me  _now_ , Alex?" Jay asked, turning to face him.

Alex remained silent. He was now pale, his mouth open in shock, and slightly trembling as he held the laptop.

This time, Jay didn't wait for an answer. Instead, he stood up and walked over to the window. After going to the library, seeing Jessica in the hospital, and now watching the entries with an amnesiac Alex, it seemed that the events of the day had been lengthy--at least, lengthy enough for it to be dark outside. Jay checked the time on his phone; it was now 10:32 pm.

"Look, Alex, whether or not you believe me--" Jay began.

"I believe you, Jay," said Alex, in a much harsher tone of voice.

Jay looked over to see Alex, now looking at him with a furrowed brow. It just dawned on Jay that perhaps it might not have been a good idea to show an amnesiac murderer what he'd done for the past few years.

"Um, Alex--" Jay started to speak.

"Jay, right now, I don't want to know anything else but the answer to this one question," Alex interrupted. He put the laptop down as he spoke, and turned to look at Jay. He noticed that there were now a couple of tear streaks down his face.

"Why did I do it?"

Jay was taken aback. He had seen Alex happy, cheerful, shy, angry, insane, and from watching Entry #86, desperate and defeated. But this was the first time he had ever seen this emotion etched on Alex's face; it was  _regret_.

"Um...well, uh...." Jay stuttered, clearly not knowing what to say.

"Please, just tell me why," Alex said.

"Alex..." said Jay, helplessly. "Look...you did what you thought was right."

"But why? Why did I  _ever_ think that killing everyone was  _right?!_ " choked Alex, trying desperately to hold back a sob.

Jay didn't answer. Alex had asked himself that question more than he had asked Jay, and so he stayed silent. As Alex started to hold his head in his hands and cry, Jay began to feel a tad bit regretful himself. In truth, Alex had really just wanted to protect more people by stopping the spread of the so-called "infection". Regardless of whether or not he had been right about the nature of that monster's spread, Alex had done what he believed was right, even after being demented and haunted by that  _thing_  for years upon years. Ironically, it seemed that the last shred of himself and his humanity was his mission to kill everyone involved with  _Marble Hornets_ ; otherwise, he was just a shell of a man.

Reflecting on all these thoughts, Jay sat down on the bed closest to the window as Alex continued to sob silently. Roughly half an hour passed, and eventually Alex's cries faded to staggered breathing, and then complete silence. Once he had finished, Alex looked up at Jay, his eyes red from tears.

"Jay...I'm so sorry. I'm sorry I did everything to you, and to Tim, and to Jessica, and...oh, god, to Amy...." he stuttered.

Jay looked over, but didn't respond. He was too busy mulling over his thoughts about the whole situation to do anything but give a slight nod.

A few more minutes of silence passed, and then Alex spoke again.

"You...you and I...we came back from the dead. Neither of us should be here right now."

"Yeah...we shouldn't," agreed Jay. "Look, if you're wondering how we got back from beyond the grave, I don't know--"

"No, no, that's not what I'm thinking about," said Alex. "It's just...are we the only ones who came back?"

Jay opened his mouth to respond, but didn't. He hadn't thought of that, even after Alex called him in the hospital parking lot. Could it be that there were others who had come back? How many of the others were still alive?

He gave it a moment's thought, and answered, "I don't think there's any way we can know that. I only learned that you were alive by coincidence."

Alex looked back down at the floor. "But there's still a chance that someone else is alive."

"...yeah, I guess you're right," Jay admitted. "But still, we have no way of figuring that out right now. Besides, I've got one more person out there that I  _know_ is alive for certain: Tim. As soon as I can, I'm going out into Rosswood Park to look for him."

"Rosswood? Um, Jay, you saw the entries--no, you  _lived_ them. You know exactly why you shouldn't be going into Rosswood Park at all, let alone at night," said Alex, looking back up at Jay.

"You don't understand, that's my only lead for finding Tim. He could be out there somewhere, and I need to find him before he gets hurt," Jay said, looking outside through the window. Somehow, he felt the something outside didn't seem quite right....

"But go out there at  _night_?! That's  _insane_ , Jay!" Alex said. "Look, at the very least, wait until morning or something!"

"Oh, so where am I supposed to go? I don't exactly have anywhere to stay but my car!" snapped Jay, looking back over at Alex.

"I mean, you could stay here...." offered Alex, pointing to the bed Jay was already sitting on.

Jay wanted to reply, but he couldn't think of a good counterargument. Hell, this was the same madman that had murdered all of the people in _Marble Hornets_ , the same one that nearly killed Jay and Jessica...the one who  _did_ kill Jay. Twice. He knew that staying with Alex was insane, even if he was only an amnesiac right now...butit was at that moment that he realized just how tired he was, and how comfortable the bed beneath him felt. In the end, it seemed, Jay couldn't resist the urge to rest.

"...alright, fine," Jay conceded. "I'll stay here for the night, then leave for Rosswood Park tomorrow morning. But I'm gonna have to get some stuff out of my car, and I need  to use your laptop to upload some of the footage I got today."

"Go ahead, Jay...go ahead," said Alex, looking back to the floor again.

Jay got up and headed for the door. Before he left, however, he turned back and looked at Alex.

"If you get any violent ideas, Alex, I  _will_ defend myself. I'm watching you."

"I know, Jay," Alex snapped, looking back up. More tears were starting to well in his eyes.

Jay sighed, and went off to his car. After another half-hour, he'd gotten everything set up. He'd uploaded the footage to Alex's laptop, and two new entries--Entry #89 at the hospital, and Entry #90 at the motel--were set up and uploading onto YouTube right now. Alex was in the bathroom washing his hands, while Jay was lying in bed, getting ready to sleep.

Once again, as his eyes closed and his mind drifted off, he couldn't help but think about the day...about coming back from the dead, about the new entries, about Alex...about Jessica...if there was one thing he could change about the day, it would be how he handled that meeting in the hospital. He should have said something else, something nicer, or just flat out told her the truth. But he didn't, and that was something he would have to live with. But then of course, his mind drifted away from that, too, and off into a deep slumber.


	6. Into the Woods

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> No, this isn't the musical. Although, if it was anything like it, Marble Hornets would be a very different series....
> 
> Anyways, Jay and Alex go to Rosswood Park.

Slowly and groggily, Jay began to wake up from his slumber. In all honesty, he didn't want to wake up; this had been the best sleep he'd had in years. Still, he had a thought at the back of his mind: Tim could be out in Rosswood Park, confused or hurt. If Jay didn't go searching now, then something could happen to him. This was all the motivation he needed to wake himself up and go.

As he sat up, Jay realized that the lights were on already. Alex, meanwhile, was sitting at the edge of his bed, dressed and staring at the floor. He looked behind his shoulder to see Jay sitting up.

"Oh, hey Jay...." he said, with a lack of feeling in his voice.

Jay didn't respond. Instead, he got out of his bed and walked over to his camera, still recording on it's tripod mount. He took out the tape and switched another one in, leaving the tape on the desk by the window. Now carrying the camera with him, as was the norm for him these days, Jay turned and headed towards the restroom.

"You just gonna get ready to go out to the woods, then?" asked Alex.

"Yeah," said Jay in a nonchalant tone. He didn't even glance at Alex as he walked by.

He was almost to the restroom when Alex spoke again.

"Jay, wait. I think there's something we need to discuss."

Coming to a stop, Jay sighed and turned around. Was Alex going to break down again?

"What?" he said, almost hostile. He didn't have the time nor the patience for anything Alex might say; he needed to get out to Rosswood Park as soon as possible, and standing around talking with an amnesiac wasn't exactly going to get him there any faster.

"Listen, Jay...I'm starting to have flashes of my memory," said Alex, still gazing at the floor. "I remember just bits and pieces, but it's there, and it's slowly coming together."

"Um...okay," said Jay, hesitant. He wasn't sure how to respond to this; any return of Alex's memory could also mean a return to madness. Involuntarily, he took a step back.

"But...there's just something that doesn't fit," Alex continued. "I think...I mean, I just...I don't remember killing Amy."

"Well, maybe that part of your memory just hasn't come back yet--" Jay suggested.

"No, I mean I  _know_ that I didn't kill her!" Alex snapped. "I remember that day when she found my old camera. When that... _thing_ appeared behind her, we both went for the top window and jumped out of it. She went first, and I went after her. But when I got down there, she was just...gone. It doesn't fit your narrative that I killed her, Jay!"

"So you think she's still out there somewhere?" asked Jay.

"I  _know_ she is, Jay!" Alex said. "Which is why I'm going to ask you to let me come with you."

"Um...what?" Jay stuttered.

"You want to find Tim, and I want to find Amy. I think that searching for one of them is our best chance of finding the other, and our chances of finding them are better if we're searching for them together. So I'm asking you to let me come with you."

"Alex, there's barely enough evidence to suggest where Tim went to," Jay argued, "but Amy? There's literally nothing about her whatsoever!"

"I know that," said Alex, evidently trying to keep his cool, "but there has to be a chance that we can find her out there. Please, Jay, this is something that I need to do!"

Jay paused. There just didn't seem to be anything that could reveal Amy's location, regardless of whether or not she was linked to Tim. But then, Jay thought about finding Alex's hiding spot in Tim's house and finding Amy's photograph sitting by the makeshift bed, about how Alex had gone out of his way to keep Amy away from the monster that stalked him...Alex had loved her, and tried his best to protect her. And then Jay thought of Jessica, and how he'd felt responsible for dragging her into this mess, and how he'd done all he could to find her after she went missing; that had to be how Alex was feeling right at this moment.

"...okay, fine," said Jay, "but I'm still watching you. Now please, Alex, let me get ready in the bathroom."

Alex waved his hand dismissively. Jay turned to step inside of the restroom, but stopped and turned back around.

"Alex, do you still have your chest-cam?" he asked.

"Uh, yeah, actually, I think it's in my duffel bag," said Alex, looking over to the bag sitting beside his bed.

"Put it on," said Jay. "You're gonna want to record what you see from now on, trust me."

\-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

After an hour, they were in the parking lot of Rosswood Park.

Looking around, the place didn't seem too different than when Jay had last visited it; the field in front of the park was still light green with grasses all around, and the treeline was tall and thick, hiding more than just a forest behind it. Then again, he last remembered going there in Entry #64 with Tim; but apparently, he'd gone back in there in Entry #82. It was strange, in his mind, that he could not yet remember the events of that entry yet, but Alex was starting to get bits and pieces of his entire memory. Maybe it had something to do with that monster...or maybe Jay was just grasping at strings by this point. He really had no idea, and was willing to accept any explanation he came across for his lack of memory on that matter.

"So, you think Tim's in there, somewhere?" asked Alex, looking out at the treeline.

"Maybe," said Jay. Truth be told, the lack of evidence telling where Tim had gone off to was well known to Jay by this point, but the impact of that fact hadn't hit him until just this moment. There really  _wasn't_ any telling where Tim was now, and Rosswood Park was the only lead they had.

"Well then, let's go," said Alex, taking the initiative and starting to walk forward. Jay sighed, and followed.

The two of them ended up reaching the first trail at the treeline, and started walking along the path. It was surprisingly decrepit on this trail, moreso than Jay remembered. The trees, too, seemed aged and graying. And the grasses all seemed to be a yellowish shade of decay. The forest at this point of the trail, it seemed, was dying. But all appearances on the outside said otherwise; the treeline had been a deep, healthy green and brown just before Alex and Jay had started to walk along the trail. Several entries ago, Jay would have been naive enough to dismiss this as just part of the trail, but by now he knew that there was something wrong here, and it did nothing to ease him. He knew that Rosswood Park somehow had some sort of weird spacial distortion, most likely caused by the presence of  _it_. Maybe the decay of the flora surrounding them was a result of that?

Eventually, they reached the end of the trail, and moved on to another one. A few minutes after they'd stepped foot onto it, the flora seemed to be restored to a more healthy state of being. To Jay, this seemed to suggest that the spacial distortion of Rosswood Park was actively changing the condition of the plants around them...or that they had been warped altogether. He prayed that their case wasn't the latter.

As the walked on, they remained silent. While Jay took notice of the changes happening around him, he also thought of how they were no doubt in the lair of that  _thing_. The further they trekked into the woods, the more Jay began to grow anxious. Why hadn't it appeared? Why hadn't his camera picked up any distortion? Why hadn't they seen any sign of Tim yet? And, more worringly, why did the trails look so unfamiliar?

But there was something else at the back of his mind, too; as he and Alex walked on, he just couldn't shake the feeling that something--or some _one_ \--was following them, deeper into the woods....

At this thought, they came to a clearing. A few yards away was the red shack from Entry #61...as well as Entry #82. Instinctively, Jay looked around for any sight of  _it_ \--but the monster wasn't around. He and Alex then approached the shack, taking a glance inside; it was still empty and messy, as it had been before.

"He's not in here," said Jay.

Alex gave him a glance that seemed to say:  _Reeeeeaaaaaally now?_ _  
_

Jay rolled his eyes, and walked back out to the clearing. He didn't like this at all; none of this was right, they shouldn't be here.

"So where to now?" asked Alex, following behind him to the clearing.

"Well, see, that's the thing," Jay replied, looking over his shoulder at Alex. "The trail isn't supposed to lead here for about a few more miles."

"Oh..." said Alex, a hint of fear in his voice. "Does that mean...that thing has been messing with the layout of this place?"

"Probably," said Jay. He thought for a minute, and then turned to face Alex all the way. "Give me your phone number."

"What?" asked Alex.

"I said, give me your phone number!" Jay demanded. "I want to see if the reception here is the reason Tim never got my phone call."

"Alright, fine," said Alex. "It's 205..."

He gave Jay the rest of his number, and the latter punched it into his phone. Soon enough, the phone in Alex's pocket began to vibrate.

"Okay, so the reception's fine...that means it had to have been that thing that stopped your call from going through," Alex said.

"Yeah," agreed Jay, looking around the clearing. He didn't like that the monster could control his phone like that. "C'mon, I don't think we should stay here any longer. Bad stuff happens when you stay in one part of Rosswood Park for too long," he said, walking away from the clearing as he spoke.

So they left the clearing for a different trail, leading to the east this time. The trail was much more open and spacious than the previous one, with some parts having open fields of huge, towering grasses and distant trees. The whole time, though, on their left stood a thick wall of thorny bushes and branches, preventing them from entering that way. For the time, they seemed to be confined again to the trail by the fields; however, after a while, the thickness of the treeline eased, and eventually they reached an opening leading into normal, thorn-less woods.

Continuing along this trail, the two of them reached another clearing, though this one was smaller and cut through by a dried stream with rocks at the bottom. Just ahead of the dry stream was the tunnel.

Alex and Jay clambered over the rocks, and then took a few steps inside of the tunnel. Unbeknownst to them both, their cameras started to whine slightly.

"So...this is where I...." said Alex, looking at the dried bloodstain on the ground.

"Yeah..." said Jay, worried about how Alex might react. "Did you know him?" he asked.

"Uh...I feel like I  _should_ , but I can't remember," said Alex.

A moment passed, and then Jay looked over to Alex. "Listen, Alex," he said. "When you attacked that man...that wasn't you. That was that thing messing with your mind. Don't ever blame yourself for what you did back then, alright?"

Alex didn't respond; he simply continued to stare.

Jay then turned back around, and continued to walk through the tunnel.

"Hey, Jay...are you sure we should be going through there?" asked Alex.

He had a point, Jay realized; nothing good had ever come from someone running through that side of the tunnel. The only person Jay had known to have come through that side of the tunnel unscathed was Brian--"Hoody"--during Entry #76. It was weird, thinking about Brian that way; how could he have gone insane like that? How did he ever manage to come back from the dead after Entry #51? Did Alex know anything about Brian during that time? Odds were that Alex couldn't even remember anything about Brian as "Hoody" right now, so Jay decided he'd leave that question for later.

Regardless, the tunnel was dangerous, even with two people in it. He wasn't sure if they should cross over; but then again, there was a reason to do so.

"No, I'm not sure we should," said Jay, "but we still need to find Tim. If it's possible that he crossed over there, then that means we need to check. So I say we go."

Alex opened his mouth to respond, but suddenly Jay's phone began to ring. Taking it out, he put the sound on speaker so that Alex could hear what was being said.

"Hello?" Jay said to the phone.

The phone was silent for a split second, and then, in a familiar voice: "Leave.  _Now_."

Then the phone call ended.

Jay and Alex stood, both of them stunned and speechless. Then Alex broke the silence.

"Jay...was that--" he began.

"Yeah, that was Tim," Jay interrupted.

"Does that mean he's here, somewhere?" asked Alex, looking around.

"...no, I don't think he is," Jay replied. He was worried; this was almost word-for-word what had happened back in Entry #64, just before things had gone to hell. The only difference was that Alex and Tim's positions had been reversed.

But something else worried him. They knew now that that thing could interfere with and stop phone calls; was it possible, then, for it to send false phone calls as well?

"Alex, I think we need to get out of here,  _now_ ," Jay said, the fear prevalent in his voice. The whining on Jay's camera had grown much more audible now, only adding to his worries.

"Yeah, c'mon, let's go!" said Alex, both of them turning around back to the entrance of the tunnel.

And at the entrance stood their faceless stalker.

"Oh, god!" screamed Alex. The both screeched to a halt at the sight of the monster; Jay actually managed to trip up and fall on his back, still facing the entrance where the thin giant gazed back at them. In that brief moment that Jay was laying on the ground, the thing staring at them slowly tilted it's head to the side, as if curious that they were there. Alex reached down and grabbed Jay's arm, pulling him back up as fast as possible, before the two of them took off, running again towards the opposite side of the tunnel. The visual and audio distortion on Jay's camera seemed to grow louder and louder; Jay himself wasn't sure if this was because of  _it_ getting closer and closer to them as they ran, or because they were headed to the tunnel's exit.

Eventually, they reached the end and kept running on into the trail-lacking forest. There was a sudden piercing noise from Jay's camera, but he did not take notice of it until he realized that he wasn't hearing Alex running beside him anymore. He soon came to a short halt, looking around for Alex, but to no avail.

"Alex?! Alex, where are you?!" he called out, getting no answer in return. There was no way that Alex could have disappeared like that; he would have seen or heard him run off in some direction. These part of the woods were just to clear and open for something like that to go unnoticed, even while they were running from that thing.

It occurred to Jay at that moment that he was no longer near the tunnel. Once again, that was impossible; they'd only run about five or ten yards from the tunnel, it should still be in sight...shouldn't it?

Jay turned back and tried to run in the direction he'd come from, if only to find a path back to civilization. But instead, he was greeted with nothing more but a continuous stretch of the same forest. He continued to run, determined to find the tunnel again--or perhaps even Alex--up until he tripped and fell flat on his face, dropping the camera in the process.

Groaning from pain, Jay slowly put his hands on the ground and pushed himself up onto his knees, only to realize that his hands were against a hard, solid floor, and that he was facing wooden panels instead of grass and dirt. Looking around revealed that he was in the two-story shed from Entry #52, where Alex had tried to shoot him and Jessica. In fact, he was sitting in the exact spot that Alex had claimed would help lead to Amy's discovery, only to find that there had been nothing there after all.

Standing up again, Jay spotted his camera lying on the floor, the captured film still distorting a tad bit. He quickly picked it up, and began to make his way towards the stairs. However, as soon as he turned to face the stairs, he found himself face-to-faceless with the monster, leaning in from the very bottom of the stairs to look right at him. He stumbled backwards and began to fall again; however, in that brief second, he realized that he should have fallen against a wall, but felt nothing meet his back as he fell.

That is, until he met the feeling of hard ground and grass again.

Jay tumbled and rolled down what seemed to be an endless hill, until finally he reached the bottom. Somehow, he'd managed to hold onto the camera the entire time, despite it screeching and distorting all the while. He tried to stand back up, but instead began to have a coughing fit. Try as he might, he couldn't be brought any higher than his hands and knees as the coughing weakened him more and more.

As he coughed, his eyes darted to the ground, and then behind him. As he did so, he spotted what looked like someone in jeans and black shoes running off into the flora behind him. It looked as if the man had on something yellow above the jeans, but Jay wasn't exactly sure what that could have been. He did not call after the man; how could he when his voice was stifled by all this coughing? Jay thought for a moment that it might have been Alex, but he was wrong; Alex wore gray-and-blue sneakers, and the jeans he'd been wearing today were lighter.

Jay wanted to get up and run after the man, but couldn't, and eventually found himself too weak to even lay on his hands and knees. And so he collapsed onto the ground, only to find himself out of the forest and inside some building. Surprisingly, Jay found his strength return to him, and he stood up slowly, though his legs were still a bit shaky. He looked around; he was now in the abandoned hospital, just outside of Rosswood Park.

Now what was he supposed to do? Had that thing really wanted him and Alex out of Rosswood Park so badly that it would send him all the way out here? How was he going to go and get to his car now, when it was probably dozens of miles away?

Suddenly, in the distance, Jay began to hear coughing. Jay turned in the direction of the sound, realizing that he wasn't the only person here.

"Alex? Alex, is that you?" he called out, but got no response beyond continued coughing.

He began to run towards the coughing, still calling out Alex's name. Eventually, he began to call out a different name.

"Tim? Are you in here?"

Still no response other than coughing. He kept running, growing closer and closer to the coughing until he found a familiar hallway. The coughing was coming out of a room just ahead.

Jay kept running towards the room until a shrill beep came from his camera. As the camera noise ended, so did the coughing. Jay ignored this and ran into the room.

It was the room where Brian had left the messages "HE IS A LIAR" and "FOLLOW ME" for Jay back in Entry #60. The room itself was empty.

Jay took a few steps inside the room, looking around for any sign of someone's presence. "Hello? Is anyone still here?" he called out, to no reply.

Then his camera began to buzz again, and Jay whirled around to face the entrance.  _It_ was standing there. _  
_

Jay stumbled backwards, hitting the wall this time. He backed towards the corner farthest away from the monster, but he knew it did not matter. Slowly, it began to take a step towards him...then another step...then another....

And then Jay was back in the parking lot of Rosswood Park.

Looking around again and again, he sighed with relief as he saw his car just a few feet ahead. He ran over and got out his keys to drive off, but then realized he could hear slight coughing and wheezing from the other side. Glancing over, he spotted Alex lying on his hands and knees, as if catching his breath from a long marathon.

"Alex!" cried Jay, running over and grabbing one of Alex's hands. The latter looked up, and he instantly looked relieved to see the former. Jay helped Alex get back on his feet, helping him towards Alex's own car.

"C'mon, Alex, we gotta get out of here," he said, helping Alex unlock the car.

"Jay...that thing...it took me...." Alex said, in between gasps for air.

"Just breathe for now, Alex," said Jay, helping him sit in his car. "We'll talk more about it when we get back to the hotel, just breathe and drive."

Alex nodded, putting on his seat belt. Jay himself ran back over to his car, and pulled out of the parking lot as fast as he could.

He did  _not_ want to come back to Rosswood Park again.


	7. The Conversation

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> ⓍⓍ

WELL, LOOK WHO'S STILL AROUND. I'M SURE YOU MUST HAVE ENJOYED THESE PAST FEW DAYS, HAVEN'T YOU?

Hello again to you, too. It hasn't been long enough.

ON THAT, WE ARE IN AGREEMENT.

You brought them back.

I DID. HOW DID YOU FIGURE IT OUT SO QUICKLY?

They were in Rosswood Park.

AH, I SUSPECTED THEY WOULD GO THERE.

Where else would they have gone?

I WILL NOT TELL YOU THAT. I KNOW BETTER THAN TO GIVE YOU IDEAS.

Do you?

I SHOULD HOPE SO.

Indeed. But I need not use this new...method of yours.

OF COURSE YOU WON'T. DOING SO WOULD ROB YOU OF THE, AH, FRUITS OF YOUR LABOUR, WOULDN'T IT?

You intend to mock me with that statement? I've heard better.

FROM WHOM?

Myself.

STILL NARCISSISTIC AS ALWAYS, AREN'T YOU.

Your insults will not stop me. I defeated you once; I can do so again. And as I said, I need not use your methods of revival; I have a much better device in my own hands. It is an "ace-in-the-hole", if you will.

AH, SO THE BOY IS UNDER YOUR CONTROL NOW?

You figured it out that quickly?

I DID.

I suppose there is no use hiding it. Yes, he is still under my control, even if he does not yet realize it.

YOU CANNOT CONTROL HIM.

I had him defeat you before, didn't I?

BUT YOU STILL DO NOT CONTROL HIM. HE HAS WAYS OF RESISTING YOU AND I.

You may be resisted, but I cannot be. And he won't resist me in the end, I think you'll find.

WE SHALL SEE. FOR NOW, I SHALL ARRANGE MY PAWN ACCORDINGLY. YOU WILL NOT WIN THIS TIME.

Oh, I will win again, and perhaps this time you might actually die.

I WILL NOT.

Perhaps. So, the power struggle has resumed?

YES, IT HAS.

Very well then. Let the pawns be put forward.


	8. A Warm Welcome

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> After battling both writer's block and crippling self-doubt, I finally have a new chapter for you guys!
> 
> After fleeing Rosswood Park, Jay and Alex look over their footage and find themselves reacquainted with some good friends.

Driving back from Rosswood Park seemed to take what felt like hours on end - but nevertheless, both Jay and Alex managed to get back to the hotel parking lot unscathed. Jay himself was quite worried that Alex wouldn't be able to drive his own car properly after what had apparently been done to him in the forest, but nevertheless he drove fine. Once again, Jay's undying faith in the safety of cars - at least, safety from faceless monsters, spacial and temporal teleportation, masked stalkers, and paranormal illness - had found circumstantial support.

Once the two of them had parked, Jay hopped out and rushed over to Alex's car, keeping the camera filming all the while. Initially he moved to Alex's door to help him stand up, but was only met with a sort of "shoo" motion, and so Jay stood back and kept watch to make sure Alex could walk. As he climbed out of his car seat, Alex gave Jay an inquisitive look; Jay himself wasn't sure if this was meant to convey a message of "I'm not an old man, I can walk just fine" or "You sure seem eager to help someone who was trying to kill you months ago."

At that thought, Jay found himself surprised. It really  _was_ odd that he was so quick to help Alex. Time and time again, he had to remind himself that this was the man that had gone on a huge killing spree, someone who could easily snap and attack him at any moment. But then again, this wasn't the same Alex; whatever had happened to him after Tim had stabbed his throat caused him to go back to the personality he had back before the filming of  _Marble Hornets_. Yet even then, this wasn't quite  _that_  Alex, either; despite memory issues, he still seemed to be recalling parts of what he'd done during his rampage - and Jay feared that he would begin to remember more than he could handle.

Regardless, Jay could tell that, for the moment at least, Alex wasn't in the mood to kill anyone - at least not now. Thus, it was safe enough to approach him. Besides, the two needed to work together to accomplish their goals; Jay doubted he'd be able to find Tim without having someone to help him, even if that someone was a former murderer.

And so the two of them headed inside of the hotel. Jay made sure to keep himself about an inch behind Alex, so that he could be ready to catch him if he fell over from exhaustion - after all, whatever Alex had gone through had been enough to leave him on his hands and knees back at Rosswood Park, nearly delirious. Fortunately, nothing terrible happened along the way to their room.

At least, not until they arrived at the room itself.

Both of the men froze when they saw what must have been dozens of sheets of paper, plastered all over the place. Scribbles, drawings, cryptic messages, all things that the two of them had become all too familiar with over the course of the past five years.

After about a second of staring, Jay instinctively whirled around to look behind him and Alex to see if whoever had placed the papers in the room were still there. Alex, however, seemed noticably confused - but only for a moment.

"Wait - aren't these the papers that got drawn...by me...back when this whole mess first got started?" he asked, turning to look at a cautious Jay.

"Almost," Jay replied, now checking the closet for anybody who might be hiding. "These aren't  _yours_ , but they're pretty damn close."

He sighed, finding no trace of an intruder, save of course for the papers plastered everywhere. "Ugh, for crying out loud! We investigate a forest one day and  _already_ somebody's breaking into our hideout!" The whole ordeal was  _really_ starting to piss Jay off. The whole day had been horrifying and terrible enough, he did  _not_ need this right now.

As Jay continued fuming over the mess, Alex took a closer look at some of the drawings. A few in particular caught his eye:

Above his and Jay's bed were two prominent bits of imagery. The drawing above Jay's bed was that of a circle with black eyes and a ghastly glaring of teeth - not quite a smile and not quite a frown. As for the one above his own bed, all there was was a strangely-shaped "S". He'd seen that letter before, in the exact same style...but where? He couldn't quite remember, but in any case it gave him a bad feeling.

On the beds themselves were various papers, but there were each two large papers that spelled out particular messages. Jay's bed had the message: "ONLY A MATTER OF TIME"; Alex's bed had the message: "KILL NOW KILL FOREVER". Clearly whoever had placed these papers here had a very...particular view of the two of them.

Jay in the meantime seemed to have calmed down and read the messages, too. Sighing, he turned to Alex and said, "Come on, pack your things - we need to leave before whoever put these down here decides to break in again."

"But...wait, hold on, where are we supposed to go?" asked Alex.

"We'll figure that out later. For now, just get your stuff together," Jay ordered, already taking a bag of his and putting what few clothes he had into it. Alex, not really understanding much that was going on, followed suit - and in no time, the two of them were gone.

* * *

 

It took Jay a while to decide where the two of them would go, but ultimately he chose for them to just park at the side of an old road; he'd rather not be in a building that a certain somebody could break and enter. Besides, he'd always had a good feeling about cars; why not just stay in them for the time being? It had taken some time for Alex to be convinced by Jay to just park and sleep in their cars overnight, but frankly they didn't have much choice; there wasn't exactly anywhere else for them to go, let alone anywhere they could be safe in.

"So fine, we're out at the side of a road for a night. Now, what the hell was that all about?" Alex asked, somehow not understanding the threat of somebody being able to break in and enter a room.

"Okay Alex, I know your memory is messed up, but even  _you_ have to understand that  _somebody broke into our apartment!_ " Jay snapped, visibly irritated once again.

Alex opened his mouth to reply, but Jay cut him off. "And not just anybody, no someone who creates cryptic messages in the  _exact same style_ that we've grown used to over the past half-decade!"

It was all too clear now what had just happened to the hotel room. The figure outside the window last night, the man in the jeans, black shoes, and yellow jacket who ran by during Jay's teleportation through Rosswood, and now both a break-in and cryptic messages...all of this could only add up to one thing, something that Jay didn't want to deal with at the moment. He should have known, that if  _he_ could come back from the dead, and even  _Alex_ could come back from the dead, then the same could apply to a certain somebody that had also died only some time earlier.

Jay didn't even need to worry about finding confirmation; he already knew  _exactly_ where to find it.

"Alex, take out your laptop."

"Um...okay," Alex replied, hesitantly taking his laptop out of a bag in his car.

The two of them were, at the moment, standing outside of their cars on the side of the road; surprisingly, even out here the laptop managed to find and connect to an open wireless network. Strange, seeing as they weren't exactly in the most urban of places. Still, this did not distract Jay from pulling up that all-too familiar YouTube channel that had hounded him over the past five years.

And, needless to say, totheark had uploaded a new video.

Several of them.

"...oh," said Alex quietly, finally understanding why Jay was so frustrated and hurried back at the hotel.

Jay didn't pause to listen to Alex's comment; he was already loading the first video. The new videos had followed the same style of the previous uploads, in that they appeared cryptic and were named with only one word, generally a noun. The videos, in order, were as follows: Departure, Permanence, Cycle, Formation, and Game. Naturally, Jay started with the first chronological upload: Departure.

Footage of Entry #87 seemed to be overlaid with a red haze; in particular was a partly glitched focus on Jessica while Tim's voice, though distorted, could be heard talking to her. After a while, it switched to a shot of Tim's mask, dark and abandoned on what looked like a concrete ground. The video then switched back to Entry #87 footage, this time Tim coughing on the ground. Again, the video switched back to the mask, this time fracturing as Tim's distorted coughs grew louder and more violent. A brief frame of an eye took hold over the broken mask, and then finally blackness covered the screen. After a pause, words, appeared with a monotonous bleep backing it as sound: "YOU ARE A LIAR". A faint scream could be heard, before blackness and silence took hold over the video once again. Finally, a single message appeared at the end of the video: the classic "REGARDS", followed by a brief flash of the letter "X" in bloody red.

And "Departure" ended there.

For once, the video, though cryptic as always, seemed straightforward enough; the uploader was calling Tim out as a liar. But what exactly was Tim lying about? The portion of Entry #87 used in the video was Tim saying farewell to Jessica; had her survival been that lie, or was it something else more subtle that Jay couldn't make out at the moment? Either way, this did not give a conclusive answer as to whether or not a certain somebody was following him and Alex.

Moving on, Jay went ahead and opened the next video, "Permanence".

A glitched, but tangible layout of a large room was visible. It held still for a few seconds, before a slight clipping effect caught one frame, and then the next a semi-frozen frame of someone in an all-too familiar hoodie reaching for the camera. The video cut to a partially glitched, partially black image with the words: "DEATH SMILES AT US". The video cut to another image of a room, this time more clear as one of the areas in Benedict Hall - specifically, the room where Alex had been killed. The shot focused straight at the bloodstains on the floor where Tim and Alex had struggled in Entry #86; meanwhile, there was a brief overlay of the words: "AGAIN AND AGAIN", before the video ended abruptly.

Well, this certainly confirmed what Jay had been afraid of, that was for sure. It appeared as if Brian had awoken inside of Benedict Hall where he had fallen to his death, just as how Jay had woken up in the basement room. What caught Jay's attention was that Brian seemed to be aware of how he was back from the dead, but that it wasn't just him; the fact that he seemingly knew where Alex had died hinted at knowledge that Brian could not possibly possess.

Regardless, all that mattered was that Jay knew that Brian was back as well.

"So...Brian's back," said Alex, coming to the same conclusion. "Does he know about us?"

"He has to," said Jay, "who else would have broken into our hotel room and put all those papers everywhere?"

"It could have been whoever uploaded 'Departure'," Alex suggested.

Jay paused. "Alex, the only person who could have uploaded that video-"

"Was dead, Jay," Alex interrupted. "He was killed by Tim; I knew it before I died, and you and I both know it now after watching Entry #83. That 'Departure' video was uploaded too soon after the last entry to be Brian, because even if he did come back to life it would have been hours later."

Jay tried to say something, but Alex had actually made a very good point. Brian was dead by then, and Tim had seemingly gotten rid of his mask once and for all, so it couldn't have been him; someone else had uploaded the video, and Jay had no idea who it could have been. This left him  _very_ unsettled.

"...well, I mean, we can't know if it was Brian or, uh, whoever uploaded the video that trashed our room," said Jay, seemingly trying to put these disturbing new thoughts out of his mind. "Look, either way, we know who's following us, and we just need to watch out for him-"

"But we don't know who uploaded the video, Jay!" said Alex, now getting worried. "Someone's been unaccounted for after all this time, and we have every reason to believe that they're still around!"

"I  _know_ , Alex!" Jay shouted, more fearful than aggravated. "Just...let's just finish up these last three videos, then we'll figure out what's going on. Alright?"

Alex stayed silent, so Jay clicked and opened the third video: Cycle.

The video started off with what appeared to be stock footage of a tire turning. The tire itself was a dark orange, whereas the surrounding area was a glaring maroonish-red. Text overlaid the tire: "DARKNESS EVADES ANY THOUGHTLESS HEATHEN". The footage came to a pause, and then began to reverse, with the tire going in the opposite direction. The words themselves faded out in an outro that was essentially the inverse of their intro. The video briefly switched to more stock footage, this time in black-and-white, with an old car being smashed by machinery; the four attached tires, still glowing dark orange, went flying off. Then, even more briefly, was a shot of the  _thing_ , faceless and suited, with a mirroring effect to show two of them beside each other. And with that, the video ended just as abruptly as the one previous to it.

Jay got an uneasy feeling from this. He already noticed that the cryptic words all started with words that spelled out "DEATH"; he'd learned to do that with videos uploaded by totheark. But the fact that the tire was reversed seemed to imply that death itself was being reversed, or perhaps undone. What's more was that the heavy red haze implied that this was the same person who uploaded "Departure"; whoever it was knew just as well as Brian that they had been coming back from the dead.

Even more fear-instilling was the footage of the car being destroyed, with the  _thing_ being shown immediately after. Aside from what seemed to be an overall malevolent intent with the violence of the car's destruction, the presence of the monster at the end seemed to imply that the uploader knew that  _it_ had something to do with it all. This wouldn't be surprising to Jay, if not for the fact that there seemed to be no leads behind anything related to his return from the dead. And if the uploader knew something about it...well, there wasn't anything he could really do about it at the moment. The only thing he  _could_ do was press on with the other videos.

"Formation" was much more straightforward. In it, some distorted footage of the outline of Rosswood Park hung in the video for most of it, with some basic messages being sent. First was "YOU EVADE THEM"; this was then briefly changed to "YOU EVADE ME" before switching to another message, which was "HIDING DOES NOTHING". This then switched to "I AM LOST", which in turn switched to "WE ARE FOUND". Then, the entire shot changed to what appeared to be Jay coughing in the shed during his trip earlier that day. A brief flash of words appeared - "THE DELUGE WILL NOT STOP" - before the video itself cut to black and ended.

Jay had had enough time to study totheark videos to understand that the only one with enough clarity to send direct messages had been Hoody, whom he know knew to be Brian. Thus, this video had to be the work of Brian. But he didn't even seem to be addressing Jay or Alex, or even Tim if he were out there.

"Is Brian...trying to talk to that new guy?" Alex asked, apparently following Jay's train of thought.

"Maybe," said Jay. He wasn't sure of it, but he had a pretty good feeling that that was what Brian was doing.

If that was the case, though, then that meant that whoever the other uploader was was apparently evading Brian. Was this another member of totheark? It seemed like it, but if so then perhaps they had gone rogue. Or maybe it was a hacker that had nothing to do with totheark, but needed to use one of the channels as a voice. In any case, there appeared to be some sort of hopelessness to Brian's message - he was alone right now, and needed someone to help him accomplish...well, whatever totheark's goal was.

But there was only one more totheark video left to look at, so perhaps the new uploader would make their move.

"Game" started with a series of flashing gray-and-black frames over the shadow of what looked like some kind of grim yet exaggerated smile. Then, the video cut to a past upload of totheark - namely, the hacked upload that had scared Jay out of his apartment during the earlier entries of Jay's "investigation". The already faint voice of Tim saying "From the start, it's been a game for us" was distorted even more heavily, with the pitch turned down and sped up just a little bit; the imagery from the hacked entry played, but this time it appeared as if the mask shots were aged and decayed, almost. Suddenly, the video switched to an undistorted shot of the sky, with the sound of birds chirping and the sight of a distant sunset clear. A single message appeared: "THEY WILL STILL PLAY", followed by another one: "ENJOY THEIR STRUGGLE SOON". A large red X flashed over the screen before the video ended altogether.

What caught Jay's attention this time was the fact that there was only one comment below, namely one from totheark itself. It read as follows:

"DO NOT HARM THEM"

It looked as if Brian and the other uploader weren't getting along so well.

"So, what does this mean for us?" asked Alex.

"It means we've got even more trouble following us," said Jay, now starting to get a headache from all the stress of fleeing a forest, and then a hotel, only to be met with an old friend and a new player altogether. "I don't like that this new guy sounds like they're planning something, but at the very least it sounds like Brian isn't exactly willing to let them hurt us. I'm not sure what that will mean for us in the future, but in the meantime I think we should just rest on it."

"Rest? But how do we know that they won't-" Alex began.

"No, Alex, please, not now," Jay snapped, massaging his temples to try and ease his newfound headache. "We've already done a lot today, it's getting late, and now that we have more dangers to worry about, I think we need to rest."

"Look, we still haven't gone over the footage from Rosswood," Alex protested.

"We were going to back at the hotel, but circumstances have changed! We'll get to it tomorrow morning, but at the very least you can look over what I recorded," Jay sighed, handing Alex his camera. With that, Jay hopped into the back seat of his car, closed his eyes, and let the exhaustion of running from a faceless monster and discovering new threats ease him into a soft sleep, leaving Alex outside just as confused as before.

 


End file.
